On this page you will find more information about the selected projects of the Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) Fund for 2025.

Inaugural lecture

Security in the broadest sense of the word was the key focus in the Interfaculty Conference on 4 April in Leiden. With almost 200 attendees and such well-known speakers as Dick Schoof, Pieter van Vollenhoven and Ad Verbrugge, the first conference was a success.

Lecture, Peace Histories Seminar Series

Lecture, Peace Histories Seminar Series

On Wednesday 24 September 2025 Marija Šerić successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

On November 16 a festschrift in honor of Dr Olivier Nieuwenhuyse was presented in a moving event at the Faculty of Archaeology. Professor Bleda Düring, a personal friend of Nieuwenhuyse, was one of the initiators. ‘If he had been here, he would have loved this book.’

Last semester, bachelor’s students in Religious Studies spent a lot of time in community centres in Leiden. The reason: field research into loneliness in the city.

Leiden University College offers Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Science degrees within a Liberal Arts & Sciences programme that focuses on Global Challenges; big challenges facing humanity and society, such as sustainability, peace, justice, prosperity and diversity. The programme’s environment is…

The English Language and Culture programme focuses on four areas, namely: philology, literature, linguistics and language acquisition. It also offers several specialisation options, ranging from renaissance literature to the use of metaphors.

The Leiden Slavery Studies Association (LSSA) is dedicated to promoting a greater understanding of slavery and post-slavery in any period and any geographical region.

Sophie Rose is one of the fellows of the Ammodo Science Fellowship 2024. She will use this fellowship to conduct research at Leiden University.

The international World Cultural Council (WCC) has awarded Nadine Akkerman, Victoria Nyst and Alicia Schrikker with Special Recognition Awards given to young scientists at the university organising the award ceremony. Leiden University organises the 34th WCC award ceremony this year.

Mayor Peter Heijkoop is busy getting to know his city better. On Monday 7 July, he visited the Faculty of Humanities. ‘A few hours and you can see how important this is.’

Are you curious about how societies are governed - and what makes a society just? At Leiden University, you’ll explore democracy, law, safety and public policy in both national and international contexts. From human rights to climate legislation, from elections to ethical dilemmas: you’ll learn to analyse…

Are you curious about how societies are governed - and what makes a society just? At Leiden University, you’ll explore democracy, law, safety and public policy in both national and international contexts. From human rights to climate legislation, from elections to ethical dilemmas: you’ll learn to analyse…

At the entrance of the Van Steenis building you may now visit an exhibition on material culture. Unexpectedly, it does not display pottery or tools, but building materials. And recent ones at that! Check out the exhibition on Legos lost at sea, conceived and assembled by PhD candidate Maia Casna. ‘These…

It's a race against time for Charles Jeurgens, Leiden Professor in Archival Studies. He is investigating how the colonial authorities created the archives in the National Archive in Jakarta. ‘The acidic paper deteriorates rapidly in this hot and humid climate.’

For decades it was thought that the family system of the ancient Egyptians was very similar to our own. However, PhD candidate Steffie van Gompel explains that the reality is somewhat different. ‘In Egyptian families, it was often the eldest son versus the rest of the children.’

Conference

Immerse yourself: read books, listen to podcasts and watch films about racism, discrimination and the colonial past.

The Radboud Institute for Culture and History is looking for a researcher/PhD candidate in the project 'The Social Life of Early Medieval Normative Texts'. Deadline for applications: July 6.

In love, we like to use great words. We promise to love each other ‘forever’ and praise the beloved as nothing less than ‘the one’ . Meanwhile, we know very well that we don’t live eternally and that we may find our ‘true love’ one day on the opposite side of the divorce table. So why do we continue…

Dr Mariana Françozo has been awarded a prestigious NWO Vici grant for a five year research project that brings together Indigenous communities, museum collections and interdisciplinary scholarship. Her project focuses on the histories and contemporary challenges of two Indigenous peoples in South America:…

The Heritage Quest project begins on Monday 6 April. Heritage Quest is the first large-scale citizen science archaeology project in the Netherlands: anyone can help find archaeological remains at Utrechtse Heuvelrug, a heavily forested region in the Netherlands. Citizens can thus get involved in scientific…

Maikel Kuijpers was invited to join a session on material rights, resource use, and craftsmanship during the Carnegie Peacebuilding Conversations held in The Hague’s Peace Palace in September. Organised by Major Alliance the session brought together a diverse panel to discuss “The Universal Declaration…

In the beginning of December 2016 PhD candidate Catarina Guzzo Falci was awarded a scholarship for a collections study by Musée du quai Branly. The Musée du quai Branly has implemented this scholarship programme to document its collections.

Sometimes fascination can lead to in-depth research. Such is the case with Wahyu Widodo, who came across the Islamic Walikutuban ritual in Java in 2019, on which he subsequently wrote his PhD dissertation. Widodo: ‘Besides community, it also breeds political loyalty’

Conference, Book presentation

Leiden University College welcomes researchers at all levels who wish to spend some time at our institution for a research project.

Lecture, Ancient History Research Seminar

The purpose of LENS – to foster, coordinate and support research in the area of the visual arts and visual media of photography, film, video and digital media – is connected to the objectives of the Master program Film and Photographic Studies.

Subproject of

The project will clarify that in the search for these new means the treatise On the sublime of ps.-Longinus played a crucial role. However, the project will also place the theatre performances in a broader social and political perspective. These public events and the theatre performances suggest that…

Lecture, Research Seminar Medieval and Early Modern History

Lecture, Peace Histories Seminar Series

From mandrill teeth to the microstructure of bones: archaeology alumna Simone Lemmers (31) is determined to reveal the past by studying old remains. Her curiosity has led to a very international career, also in the UK, where she witnessed the Brexit referendum.

The war between Ukraine and Russia is playing out not just on the battlefield but also on the geopolitical playing field of gas. Conflicts at the start of this century about this energy source were, says PhD candidate Ilia Barboutev, a precursor to today’s war.

Dr. Mark Westmoreland (Institute of Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology) and Dr. Francesco Ragazzi (Institute of Political Science) have been awarded a Seed grant for their project, ‘Other “ways of knowing”: should we prepare for a post-textual turn in the social sciences?’. The grant amounts…

2025 marks the 50th anniversary of the first United Nations World Conference on Women (Mexico City, 1975), a process that led to the creation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995). The Global Transformations and Governance Challenges Programme organised a roundtable to reflect on…

The Rijksmuseum welcomes international, independent research proposals which open new perspectives on the museum’s collection, its history and activities. The programme enables highly talented candidates to base part of their research at the Rijksmuseum, and offers access to the museum’s expertise,…

University lecturer Miko Flohr talks in a new BBC documentary about how people responded to the eruption of 79, and on whether or not they were excavating a fullonica.

For a while, it was uncertain whether prominent American politician Nancy Pelosi would travel to Taiwan. But last Tuesday, she did visit – much to the displeasure of China. Asia expert Casper Wits explains why China reacted so strongly and what the consequences of the visit may be.

New housing in old labs and striking architecture for University buildings and high-tech companies, not to mention waterside parks. An exhibition in Oude UB shows the radical changes that are in store for the Leiden Bio Science Park over the coming years.

As part of Mariana Françozo’s BRASILAE project, a group of representatives of the Ka’apor people was invited to visit Leiden. The Ka’apor, an indigenous people from Brazil, are some of the present-day relatives of the Tupi-speaking peoples who used to live in the northeastern region of Brazil, claimed…

Members of the collective explore what it means to be ‘human’, in the past and present, from a range of different perspectives and inter-disciplinary approaches.